ADMINISTRATION OF WILLIAM PITT.

We come now to consider the most eventful administration, in many important respects, in British annals. The greatness of military operations, the magnitude of reforms, and the great number of illustrious statesmen and men of genius, make the period, when William Pitt. Pitt managed the helm of state, full of interest and grandeur.

William Pitt, Early Life of Pitt. second son of the first Earl of Chatham, entered public life at a very early age, and was prime minister of George III. at a period of life when most men are just completing a professional education. He was a person of extraordinary precocity. He entered Cambridge University at the age of fourteen, and at that period was a finished Greek and Latin scholar. He spent no idle hours, and evinced but little pleasure in the sports common to boys of his age. He was as successful in mastering mathematics as the languages, and was an admirer of the profoundest treatises of intellectual philosophy. He excelled in every branch of knowledge to which he directed his attention. In 1780, at the age of twenty-one, he became a resident in Lincoln\'s Inn, entered parliament the succeeding spring, and immediately assumed an active part. His first speech astonished all who heard him, notwithstanding that great expectations were formed concerning his power. He was made chancellor of the exchequer at the age of twenty-three, and at a time when it required a finance minister of the greatest experience. Nor would the Commons have acquiesced in his appointment to so important a post, in so critical a state of the nation, had not great confidence existed as to his abilities. From his first appearance, Pitt took a commanding position as a parliamentary orator; nor, as such, has he ever, on the whole, been surpassed. His peculiar talents fitted him for the highest post in the gift of his sovereign, and the circumstances of the times, in addition, were such as were calculated to develop all the energies and talents he possessed. He was not the most commanding intellect of his age, but he was, unquestionably, the greatest orator that England has produced, and exercised, to the close of his career, in spite of the opposition of such men as Burke, Fox, and Sheridan, an overwhelming parliamentary influence. He was a prodigy; as great in debate, and in executive power, as Napoleon was in the field, Bacon in philosophy, or Shakspeare in poetry. It is difficult for us to conceive how a young man, just emerging from college halls, should be able to answer the difficult questions of veteran statesmen who had been all their lives opposing the principles he advanced, and to assume at once the powers with which his father was intrusted only at a mature period of life. Pitt was almost beyond envy, and the proud nobles and princely capitalists of the richest, proudest, and most conservative country in the world, surrendered to him the guardianship of their liberties with no more fear or distrust than the hereditary bondmen of Turkey or Russia would have shown in hailing the accession of a new emperor. He was born to command, one of nature\'s despots, and he assumed the reins of government with a perfect consciousness of his abilities to rule.

He was only twenty-four years of age when he began to reign; for, as prime minister of George III., he was, during his continuance in office, the absolute ruler of the British empire. He had, virtually, the nomination of his colleagues, and, through them, the direction of all executive affairs. He was controlled by the legislature only, and parliament was subservient to his will. What a proud position for a young man to occupy! A commoner, with a limited fortune, to give laws to a vast empire, and to have a proud nobility obedient to his will; and all this by the force of talents alone—talents which extorted admiration and respect. He selected Lord Thurlow as chancellor, Lord Gower as president of the council, the Duke of Richmond as lord privy seal, Lords Carmarthen and Sydney as secretaries of state, and Lord Howe as first lord of the admiralty. These were his chief associates in resisting a powerful opposition, and in regulating the affairs of a vast empire—the concerns of India, the national debt, the necessary taxation, domestic tranquillity, and intercourse with foreign powers. But he deserved the confidence of his sovereign and of the nation, and they sustained him in his extraordinary embarrassments and difficulties.

The Policy of Pitt. policy of the administration is not here to be discussed; but it was the one pursued, in the main, by his father, and one which gratified the national pride. The time has not yet come for us to decide, with certainty, on the wisdom of his course. He was the advocate of measures which had for their object national aggrandizement. He was the strenuous defender of war, and he would oppose Napoleon and all the world to secure pre?minence to Great Britain. He believed that glory was better than money; he thought that an overwhelming debt was a less evil than national disgrace; he exaggerated the resources and strength of his country, and believed that it was destined to give laws to the world; he underrated the abilities of other nations to make great advances in mechanical skill and manufacturing enterprise; he supposed that English manufactures would be purchased forever by the rest of the world, and therefore that England, in spite of the debt, would make all nations contribute to her glory and wealth. It was to him a matter of indifference how heavily the people were taxed to pay the interest on a fictitious debt, provided that, by their commerce and manufactures, they could find abundant means to pay this interest. And so long as England could find a market for her wares, the nation would not suffer from taxation. His error was in supposing that England, forever, would manufacture for the world; that English skill was superior to the skill of all other nations; that there was a superiority in the very nature of an Englishman which would enable him, in any country, or under any circumstances, to overcome all competitors and rivals. Such views were grateful to his nation; and he, by continually flattering the national vanity, and ringing the changes on glory and patriotism, induced it to follow courses which may one day result in overwhelming calamities. Self-exaggeration is as fatal to a nation as it is to an individual, and constitutes that pride which precedes destruction. But the mere debt of England, being owed to herself, and not to another nation, is not so alarming as it is sometimes supposed. The worst consequence, in a commercial point of view, is national bankruptcy; but if England becomes bankrupt, her factories, her palaces, her warehouses, and her ships remain. These are not destroyed. Substantial wealth does not fly from the island, but merely passes from the hands of capitalists to the people. The policy of Pitt has merely enriched the few at the expense of the many—has confirmed the power of the aristocracy. When manufacturers can no longer compete with those of other countries, upon such unequal terms as are rendered necessary in consequence of unparalleled taxation to support the public creditors, then the public creditors must suffer rather than the manufacturer himself. The manufacturer must live. This class composes a great part of the nation. The people must be fed, and they will be fed; and they can be fed as cheaply as in any country, were it not for taxes. The policy of Pitt, during the period of commercial prosperity, tended, indeed, to strengthen the power of the aristocracy—that class to which he belonged, and to which the House of Commons, who sustained him, belonged. But it was suicidal, as is the policy of all selfish men; and ultimately must tend to revolutionary measures, even though those measures may not be carried by massacres and blazing thrones.

But we must hasten to consider the leading events which characterized the administration of William Pitt. These were the troubles in Ireland, parliamentary reforms, the aggrandizement of the East India Company, the trial of Hastings, debates on the slave trade, and the war with France in consequence of the French Revolution.

The Difficulties with Ireland. difficulties with Ireland did not become alarming until the French Revolution had created a spirit of discontent and agitation in all parts of Great Britain. Soon after his accession to power, Mr. Flood, a distinguished member of the Irish House of Commons, brought in a bill of parliamentary reform, which, after a long debate, was negatived. Though his measure was defeated in the House, its advocates out of doors were not cast down, but took measures to form a national congress, for the amelioration of the evils which existed. A large delegation of the people actually met at Dublin, and petitioned parliament for the redress of grievances. Mr. Pitt considered the matter with proper attention, and labored to free the commerce of Ireland from the restraints under which it labored. But, in so doing, he excited the jealousy of British merchants and manufacturers, and they induced him to remodel his propositions for the relief of Ireland, which were then adopted. Tranquillity was restored until the year 1791, when there appeared at Belfast the plan of an association, under the name of the The United Irishmen. United Irishmen, whose object was a radical reform of all the evils which had existed in Ireland since its connection with England. This association soon extended throughout the island, and numbered an immense body of both Protestants and Catholics who were disaffected with the government. In consequence of the disaffections, especially among the Catholics, the English ministry made many concessions, and the legislature allowed Catholics to practice law, to intermarry with Protestants, and to obtain an unrestrained education. But parliament also took measures to prevent the assembling of any convention of the people, and augmented the militia in case of disturbance. But disturbances took place, and the United Irishmen began to contemplate an entire separation from England, and other treasonable designs. In consequence of these commotions, the Habeas Corpus Act was suspended, and a military government was enforced with all its rigor. The United Irish pretended to submit, but laid still deeper schemes, and extended their affiliations. In May, 1797, the number of men enrolled by the union in Ulster alone was one hundred thousand, and their organization was perfect. The French government was aware of the union, which gradually numbered five hundred thousand men, and promised it assistance. The Irish, however, relied chiefly upon themselves, and prepared to resist the English government, which was resolved on pursuing the most vigorous measures. A large military force was sent to Ireland, and several ringleaders of the contemplated insurrection were arrested.

But the timely discovery of the conspiracy prevented one of the most bloody contests which ever happened in Ireland. Nevertheless, the insurrection broke out in some places, and in the county of Wexford was really formidable. The rebels numbered twenty thousand men. They got possession of Wexford, and committed great barbarities; but they were finally subdued by Lord Cornwallis. Had the French co?perated, as they had promised, with a force of fifteen thousand, it is not improbable that Ireland would have been wrested from England. But the French had as much as they could do, at this time, to take care of themselves; and Ireland was again subjected to greater oppressions than before.

The Irish parliament had hitherto been a mere body of perpetual dictators. By the Octennial Bill, this oligarchy was disbanded, and the House of Commons wore something of the appearance of a constitutional assembly, and there were found in it some men of integrity and sagacity. Ireland also had her advocates in the British senate; but whenever the people or the parliament gained a victory over the viceroy, some accident or blunder deprived the nation of reaping the fruits. The Commons became again corrupted, and the independence which Ireland obtained ceased to have a value. The corrupted Commons basely surrendered all that had been obtained. In vain the eloquence of Curran and Grattan. The Irish nation, without public virtue, a prey to faction, and a scene of corruption, became at last powerless and politically helpless. The rebellion of 1798 was a mere peasants\' war, without intelligence to guide, or experience to counsel. It therefore miserably failed, but did not fail until fifty thousand rebels and twenty thousand royalists had perished.

In June, 1800, the union of England and Ireland. union of Ireland and England was effected, on the same basis as that between England and Scotland in the time of Anne. It was warmly opposed by some of the more patriotic of the Irish statesmen, and only carried by corruption and bribery. By this union, foreign legislation took the place of the guidance of those best qualified to know the national grievances; the Irish members became, in the British senate, merely the tools of the administration. Absenteeism was nearly doubled, and the national importance nearly annihilated in a political point of view. But, on the other hand, an oligarchal tyranny was broken, and the bond of union which bound the countries was strengthened, and the nation subsided into a greater state of tranquillity. Twenty-eight peers and one hundred commoners were admitted into the English parliament.

Notwithstanding the suppression of the rebellion of 1798, only five years elapsed before another one was contemplated—the result of republican principles, and of national grievances. The leaders were Robert Emmet and Thomas Russell. But their treasonable designs were miserably supported by their countrymen, and they were able to make but a feeble effort, which immediately failed. These men were arrested, tried, and executed. The speech of Emmet, before his execution, has been much admired for its spirit of patriotism and pensive eloquence. His grand mistake consisted in overrating the strength of democratic influences, and in supposing that, by violent measures, he could overturn a strong military government. The Irish were not prepared for freedom, still less republican freedom. There was not sufficient concert, or patriotism, or intelligence, to secure popular liberty, and the antipathy between the Catholic and Protestant population was too deeply seated and too malignant to hope, reasonably, for a lasting union.

All the measures which have been adopted for the independence and elevation of Ireland have failed, and the country is still in as Condition of Ireland. lamentable a state as ever. It presents a grand enigma and mystery to the politician. All the skill of statesmen is baffled in devising means for the tranquillity and improvement of that unhappy and unfortunate country. The more privileges the people gain, and the greater assistance they receive, the more unreasonable appear to be their demands, and the more extravagant their expectations. Still, there are great and shameful evils, which ought to be remedied. There are nearly five millions of acres of waste land in the country, capable of the highest cultivation. The soil is inexhaustibly rich, the climate is most delightful, and the natural advantages for agriculture and commerce unprecedented. Still the Irish remain oppressed and poor; enslaved by their priests, and ground down to the earth by exacting landlords and a hostile government. There is no real union between England and Ireland, no sympathy between the different classes, and an implacable animosity between the Protestant and Catholic population. The northern and Protestant part of the island is the most flourishing; but Ireland, in any light it may be viewed, is the most miserable country, with all the gifts of nature, the worst governed, and the most afflicted, in Christendom; and no human sagacity or wisdom has yet been able to devise a remedy for the innumerable evils which prevail. The permanent causes of the degradation of the Irish peasantry, in their own country, have been variously attributed to the Roman Catholic priesthood, to the tyranny of the government, to the system by which the lands are leased and cultivated, and to the natural elements of the Irish character. These, united, may have produced the effects which all philanthropists deplore; but no one cause, in particular, can account for so fine a nation sinking into such poverty and wretchedness, especially when it is considered that the same idle and miserable peasantry, when transplanted to America, exhibit very different dispositions and tastes, and develop traits of character which command respect and secure prosperity.

The first plan for Parliamentary Reform. parliamentary reform was brought forward by Pitt in 1782, before he was prime minister, in consequence of a large number of the House representing no important interests, and dependent on the minister. But his motion was successfully opposed. In May, 1783, he brought in another bill to add one hundred members to the House of Commons, and to abolish a proportionate number of the small and obnoxious boroughs. This plan, though supported by Fox, was negatived by a great majority. In 1785, he made a third attempt to secure a reform of parliament, and again failed; and with this last attempt ended all his efforts for this object. So persuaded was he of the impracticability of the measure, that he even uniformly opposed the object when attempted by others. Moreover, he changed his opinions when he perceived the full connection and bearing of the subject with other agitating questions. He was desirous of a reform, if it could be obtained without mischief; but when it became a democratic measure, he opposed it with all his might. Indeed, he avowed that he preferred to have parliament remain as it was, forever, rather than risk any prospects of reform when the country was so deeply agitated by revolutionary discussions. Mr. Pitt perfectly understood that those persons who were most eager for parliamentary reform, desired the overthrow of the existing institutions of the land, or, at least, such as were inconsistent with the hereditary succession to the throne, hereditary titles, and the whole system of entailed estates. Mr. Pitt, as he grew older, more powerful, and more experienced, became more aristocratic and conservative; feared to touch any of the old supports of the constitution for fear of producing a revolution—an evil which, of all evils, he most abhorred. Mr. Burke, though opposed to the minister, here defended him, and made an eloquent speech against revolutionary measures. Nor can we wonder at the change of opinion, which Mr. Pitt and others admitted, when it is considered that the advocates of parliamentary reform also were associated with men of infidel and dangerous principles. Thomas Paine was one of the apostles of liberty in that age, and his writings had a very great and very pernicious influence on the people at large. It is very singular, but nevertheless true, that some of the most useful reforms have been projected by men of infidel principles, and infidelity and revolutionary excess have generally been closely connected.

But the reform question did not deeply agitate the people of England until a much later period. One of the most exciting events, in the domestic history of England during the administration of Pitt, was the trial of Hastings and the difficulties which grew out of the aggrandizement of the East India Company.

In the chapter on colonization, allusion was made to Indian affairs until the close of the administration of Lord Clive. Warren Hastings. Warren Hastings continued the encroachments and conquests which Clive had so successfully begun. He went to India in 1750, at the age of seventeen, as a clerk in the service of the company. It was then merely a commercial corporation. His talents and sagacity insured his prosperity. He gradually was promoted, and, in 1772, was appointed head of the government in Bengal. But the governor was not then, as he now is, nearly absolute, and he had only one vote in the council which represented the company at Calcutta. He was therefore frequently overruled, and his power was crippled. But he contrived to make important changes, and abolished the office of the minister to whom was delegated the collection of the revenue and the general regulation of internal affairs—an office which had been always held by a native. Hastings transferred the internal administration to the servants of the company, and in various other ways improved the finances of the company, the members of which were indifferent, comparatively, to the condition of the people of India, provided that they themselves were enriched. To enrich the company and extend its possessions, even at the expense of justice and humanity, became the object of the governor-general. He succeeded; but success brought upon him the imprecations of the natives and the indignant rebukes of his own countrymen. In less than two years after he had assumed the government, he added four hundred thousand pounds to the annual income of the company, besides nearly a million in ready money. But the administration of Hastings cannot be detailed. We can only notice that part of it which led to his trial in England.

The great event which marked his government was the War with Hyder Ali. war with Hyder Ali, the Mohammedan sovereign of Mysore. The province of Bengal and the Carnatic had been, for some time, under the protection of the English. Adjoining the Carnatic, in the centre of the peninsula, were the dominions of Hyder Ali. Had Hastings been governor of Madras, he would have conciliated him, or vigorously encountered him as an enemy. But the authorities at Madras had done neither. They provoked him to hostilities, and, with an army of ninety thousand men, he invaded the Carnatic. British India was on the verge of ruin. Hyder Ali was every where triumphant, and only a few fortified places remained to the English.

Hastings, when he heard of the calamity, instantly adopted the most vigorous measures. He settled his difficulties with the Mahrattas; he suspended the incapable governor of Fort George, and sent Sir Eyre Coote to oppose the great Mohammedan prince who threatened to subvert the English power in India.

But Hastings had not the money which was necessary to carry on an expensive war with the most formidable enemy the English ever encountered in the East. He therefore resolved to plunder the richest and most sacred city of India—Benares. It was the seat of Indian learning and devotion, and contained five hundred thousand people. Its temple, as seen from the Ganges, was the most imposing in the Eastern world, while its bazaars were filled with the most valuable and rare of Indian commodities; with the muslins of Bengal, the shawls of Cashmere, the sabres of Oude, and the silks of its own looms.

This rich capital was governed by a prince nominally subject to the Great Mogul, but who was dependent on the Nabob of Oude, a large province north of the Ganges, near the Himmaleh Mountains. Benares and its territories, being oppressed by the Nabob of Oude, sought the protection of the British. Their protection was, of course, readily extended; but it was fatal to the independence of Benares. The alliance with the English was like the protection Rome extended to Greece when threatened by Asia, and which ended in the subjection of both Greece and Asia. The Rajah of Benares became the vassal of the company, and therefore was obliged to furnish money for the protection he enjoyed.

But the tribute which the Rajah of Benares paid did not satisfy Hastings. He exacted still greater sums, which led to an insurrection and ultimate conquest. The fair domains of Cheyte Sing, the lord of Benares, were added to the dominions of the company together with an increased revenue of two hundred thousand pounds a year. The treasure of the rajah amounted to two hundred and fifty thousand pounds, and this was divided as prize money among the English.

The rapacious governor-general did not obtain the treasure which he expected to find at Benares, and then resolved to Robbery of the Princesses of Oude. rob the Princesses of Oude, who had been left with immense treasures on the death of Suraj-w Dowlah, the nabob vizier of the Grand Mogul. The only pretext which Hastings could find was, that the insurrection at Benares had produced disturbances at Oude, and which disturbances were imputed to the princesses. Great barbarities were inflicted in order to secure these treasures; but the robbers were successful, and immense sums flowed into the treasury of the company. By these iniquities, the governor fou............